


Epistolary Outtakes

by bea_meupscotty



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: AU, F/M, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Infidelity
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2020-06-30 01:51:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19843087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bea_meupscotty/pseuds/bea_meupscotty
Summary: A collection of snippets and drabbles from the Epistolary Charms universe.





	Epistolary Outtakes

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Epistolary Charms](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14742692) by [bea_meupscotty](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bea_meupscotty/pseuds/bea_meupscotty). 



> As it says on the tin - snippets, outtakes and drabbles from the universe of my ongoing story, Epistolary Charms. Highly recommend reading that first, but you can probably muddle through without. May up the rating as it goes on. 
> 
> Note that this chapter contains _trigger warning_ discussion of violence and attempted suicide.

Ginny had never once wished so fervently that it was autumn. She had always loved the summer, the endless days running outside, sneaking brooms out of the shed and soaring through the countryside, the sun kissing a thousand tiny freckles onto her pale skin while the wind whipped away any trace of perspiration. Even the summer before her first year at Hogwarts, when she had been desperate to finally join the rest of her siblings at that magical castle, she had savored the long summer days stretching into warm summer nights, as she saw it the last gasp of her childhood before she grew up, became a _Hogwarts student_. Now, though, that same familiar warm summer night did nothing to soothe the fire pulsing through her veins or the hot tears spilling down her cheeks; nothing like a stiff autumn breeze could have done to cool her from her feverish state. 

Instead, she found herself pacing quickly along familiar paths to the park near Grimmauld Place, gulping in deep breaths of the warm night air as if it could save her. It wasn’t a big thing, the park, mostly just a square with a little duck pond in the center, but there was an oak tree at one end with a bench underneath and when she laid on the ground between the bench and the pond, she could look up and see just the tree’s branches swaying over her, and hear the soft lapping of the pond near her feet, and imagine she wasn’t in the middle of Islington, but instead somewhere wild and open. Somewhere where her aching heart could burst free, where she could run or fly through hills so fast the ghosts of her past couldn’t catch her. 

The ghosts seemed to haunt her always, but lately had been weighing heavy on her soul. There was no rhyme or reason to it, no anniversary, no in memoriam story in the papers, not even a laughing redhead she passed on the street. It was only that some days she was fine, and other days she woke up feeling as if she would drown in a sea of regrets as the people she’d failed looked on mournfully. She was close to the pond now, which was good, because she’d realized that she wasn’t panting for breath because of her frenzied pace, but because the tears were threatening to choke her again, breath catching heavy in her throat. She swallowed the lump in her throat and did what she’d always done, took her unending abyss of grief and buried it in fire, let the anger wash over her and drown out the pain. 

Not always, but tonight, at least, anger at Harry. She’d confronted him, again, about the house. After a long day of cleaning and fighting and missteps, she’d tried to invite a couple of the Harpies over for drinks and to watch a Muggle movie Hermione had told her about, but they hadn’t even been twenty minutes in when Lydia had run for the restroom and brushed too close to one of the old Black paintings, which had begun wailing about blood traitors and halfblood filth and Muggle objects desecrating the most sacred house of Black. She’d eventually managed to threaten it into submission, with fire dancing at the tip of her wand, but the movie night was ruined; the other girls looked at her with pity in their eyes, and that, more than even the hideous yowling of the portraits, turned Ginny’s stomach to lead. In light of the screaming and the reminder of the still too-recent war, the Muggle rom com had seemed maudlin, smiles stretched too wide across teeth too big and white, white like bone, laughter too bright and oddly threatening in the darkened night of the room. Or maybe it was just Ginny who could see only horror in it all. 

When they’d gone, Ginny had padded through long, dark hallways to her bedroom with Harry, the ghost of the movie laugh track echoing in the back of her head. Somehow it just sounded like Tom. Laughing as she passed the room she’d de-Doxified with the twins, Fred still grumbling just out of sight, laughing as she saw Sirius brooding in another room, laughing at her because he’d taken them all with him. 

“Has anyone made any progress on figuring out how to get these stupid bloody portraits unstuck?” Ginny said, trying to sound merely annoyed and not haunted. 

Harry, laying in bed looking over a stack of paperwork for the morning, shrugged. “I dunno, ‘spose not. Hermione said she’d look into it, but you know how busy she is.” 

“Is there anyone else who might know something we don’t? Surely someone at the Auror office knows a thing or two about taking things that don’t want to be taken, and those portraits are so vile they should definitely count as dark artifacts.” 

Harry blinked up at her from behind his glasses, chuckling slightly. “I’ll ask around again, but that is kind of the point of the permanent sticking charm, Gin. Maybe... it’d just be easier if we learn to live with them, instead of trying to fight with them all the time.” 

Ginny bit down on her lower lip, feeling the frustration rise within her. “I don’t think that’s possible, Harry. I mean, I would like to eventually have _people_ over without having to apologize for the prejudiced rantings of a 200-year old painting.” 

Harry sighed heavily, setting down his stack of papers. “I know, Gin, I’m sorry. It’s just one of those things we have to work through with this house.” 

Ginny felt the rush of anger rising inside of her, embraced it, let it wash away the other emotions - the same way that it had always done, the way the rush of anger behind a thrown fist or a Bat-Bogey hex could drown the tide of shame from being sneered at for being poor and the sad glances at her hand-me-downs. 

“I know it means a lot to you, Harry, but what if... what if we stopped trying to work through things with this bloody house? We’ve put so much work into it already and it _still_ gives me the heebie jeebies. And I can tell it makes you sad, being back in this place.” She could feel his hackles raising, but didn’t back down, her eyes blazing. “Don’t you dare deny it, Harry James Potter, I see that look you get when you pass his old room, when we’re sitting in the kitchen and you look up as if you expect to see them all come in for dinner. I get it, Harry, I do, I feel it too. _Please_ , let’s go, let’s find someplace brilliant and new and make it _our_ home.”

Harry’s face tightened. “It’s the only thing I have left of him, Gin, you know that. Maybe it’s sad, but maybe I _want_ to be reminded of everyone here.”

Ginny felt hot tears pricking at her eyes, but she still met Harry’s gaze. “Well maybe I _don’t_. Maybe I don’t want to be reminded of Sirius and Tonks and F-fred and even Professor Snape.” 

They stayed like that, looking at each other across the gaping chasm of their grief, the dead which some nights brought them together, clasped together tightly as they exchanged happy memories and laughter and tears, but some nights, like this, seemed an inescapable, neverending gap that could not be bridged. 

“I don’t know what to tell you, Gin. I just can’t. I can’t give up on it yet.” 

Ginny felt the tears well up in her again, fought against it with the blazing fire of her anger, hot and familiar inside of her. She’d always known what it would be like to love Harry, to watch him go to war, to watch him sacrifice himself in the fight against Voldemort, but she’d never understood what it would do to her - the war, loving him, loving him through the war, surviving the war. 

“And I just can’t stay in this bloody ghost of a house one second longer!” She let the anger bubble up, let it scorch through her, hot and familiar and oh so preferable to the well of loss and helpless frustration at her and Harry’s impossible position, and she turned on her heel and stomped out of the house, slamming the front door so hard she knew that the portraits would wake. She felt bad that Harry would have to deal with them, but not bad enough to turn around, not yet. At some point, later, after she’d calmed the raging storm within her, she could go back to him, stroke his messy hair and kiss her hero on the forehead, but right now she needed to be alone, to feel the space of the boundless night sky above her and remember what it felt like to breathe.

As she approached the old oak, she was concentrating on the ground in front of her and her effort to control her sobs, so it wasn’t until she nearly there that she realized her spot was not empty. A lone figure sat on the bench under the oak tree, elbows resting on long lanky limbs, head hung down between hunched shoulders. As the figure shifted slightly and Ginny moved closer, a shaft of moonlight fell on its dark outline and Ginny recognized with a start of revulsion the pale skin, white-blonde hair, and unmistakeable features of Draco Malfoy. 

“Malfoy?” she breathed, half-disbelief and half-venom. As he turned and saw her, she watched as the man before her changed entirely, suddenly straightening, shoulders rolled back, chin tilted high, sharp features distorted into a haughty mask. 

“Weasley.” 

He said her name with supreme indifference, sounding as if it exhausted him just to be forced to acknowledge her existence, and she felt the fire twist in her gut. 

“Leave.” 

He raised one brow in response. 

“This is my spot,” she ground out through gritted teeth. “So leave.”

He snorted, and his lips drew back in a ghost of his former sneer. “This is a public park, Weasley, so unless you’ve stooped to living in a tent on the ground, this is not your ‘spot’. Then again, sleeping on the dirt probably reminds you of home.” 

Ginny stood for a moment, and if for an instant Malfoy thought he’d rendered her speechless with his insult, he surely quickly realized that Ginny was in those moments keeping herself from cursing him into oblivion. Instead, after a few moments to rein herself in, she merely exploded in furious rage, shouting at him.

“How dare you, Malfoy? How _dare_ you sit here and insult me still and act like I am nothing but the dirt beneath your feet!” To his credit, the blonde looked startled at her sudden outburst, leaning back slightly with eyes widening, but Ginny had started, and all the grief and rage she’d been stifling all night spilled out at once, her mind racing, the dam inside of her burst. She squeezed her eyes shut against the sight of him, against the night, against the reality of it all, against everything but her rage. “The only things you ever had going for you, the only reasons anyone ever pretended to give one single shit about you, were your blood, your money, and your name, and where has any of that left you? We fought a war over this, and you _lost_. None of it is worth anything, not your blood money, not your ruined name, and not your oh-so-pure blood. So no, you don’t get to sit here and sneer down at me like _I_ am the one who is worthless, when I fought in that war, when I watched my friends and family _die_ to save this world. And what did you do? You were too much of a coward to to do anything - too much of a coward to properly fight for Voldemort, too much of a coward to fight against him. You killed them - you as much as killed them, and I don’t care if you weren’t holding the wand when you were the one responsible - for Dumbledore, for all the deaths that followed. You’re pathetic, and the biggest tragedy of it all is that you’re here, you’re not even in Azkaban with your father, you’re alive, and _they’re dead_. It should have been you. _It should have been you._.” 

Ginny was panting by the time she was done, and tears were stinging at her eyes but she clenched her hands into fists so tightly that her nails drew blood, the sharp pain bringing her back to earth, out of that spiral of anger and grief and memories and ghosts, back to Malfoy sitting in front of her, still as a statue, marble in the moonlight. 

She waited for the hex, for the punch, for the sharp cutting words, even a pitiful sob. Instead, he just rose from the bench, not turning to look at her, face eerily still except for the subtle movement of his lips, silhouetted in the moonlight, as he said, “Have your spot, Weasley,” before he turned on himself and Apparated away. 

No matter how long Ginny laid in her spot, waiting for the trees and the wind and the water to soothe her, every time she tried Malfoy’s impassive face, pale as any of her ghosts, floated up into her mind.

* * *

The next day, she went to practice looking like a zombie, relying on muscle memory as she went through her drills listlessly. Halfway through, Gwenog blew her whistle and they all descended.

“Break! Anyone not in the air in 10 minutes does double laps all week.” The Harpies groaned, but set off toward the locker room at a rapid pace to refresh themselves in their allotted ten minutes. Ginny started to amble after them, but was stopped by a hand on her shoulder. 

“What in the bloody hell is up with you, Weasley? I’ve seen my granny fly better than you’re flying today and she’s 145.” 

Ginny’s temper, already strung tight from the day before, snapped briefly before she could wrangle herself back under control. “Well then maybe you should hire your granny to be your Chaser.” Gwenog merely stared at her, one brow raised, before Ginny deflated, her hand falling back as she groaned. “Fuck, Gwen, I’m sorry. I know. I’ve been... dealing with some things at home and I’m having trouble leaving it at the gate.” 

The older witch nodded. “You don’t have to tell me anything. Probably better if you don’t. Remember, this is the pitch - it’s its own world. Whatever’s going on out there,” she said, gesturing vaguely at the gates, “it doesn’t exist here. Only Quidditch exists here. I know you know that. You’re a damn good Chaser, Ginny. Do what you need to do to to be able to leave it all out there.” 

Ginny took in a deep steadying breath, blinking back tears which had sprung suddenly into her eyes, and just nodded back at Gwenog, giving her a thin smile. Gwenog clapped her on the back, and Ginny turned towards the locker room. When she entered, most of the Harpies, having already sated their immediate thirst and need to sit, had now turned to gossip. Ginny grabbed a water bottle out of her locker, gulping at it without much thought to her surroundings, when a snippet of conversation from a large group next to her caught her attention. 

“Good riddance, if you ask me,” one of the girls was saying, a dark-eyed Beater a few years older than her. 

“Don’t you think that’s a little harsh?” another responded in incredulous tones.

Angelina’s voice, booming this time. “After what he did to Katie, it doesn’t seem harsh enough.” 

Ginny’s head whipped to the side at that. “What are you talking about?” she asked, brows furrowed, mind scrabbling at pieces of information. 

The Beater was the one who turned to her, holding a Prophet aloft. “Haven’t you heard? Guess you didn’t read the paper this morning. Malfoy’s in St. Mungo’s, critical condition. Papers say he tried to off himself.” 

The world turned pale, narrowed to Ginny’s shallow breathing and the memory of Malfoy’s pale, still face, illuminated in the moonlight, the memory of her words - _it should have been you, it should have been you, it should have been you_ \- a steady drumbeat. It was only through sheer will that Ginny stood standing as her world crumpled in on itself, as she realized what she’d done, and she glanced down at her trembling hands for a moment half expecting to see Malfoy’s blood on them, at long last that sight of blood on her hands again, and she felt her throat grow tight and the caustic burn of vomit trying to force its way up and out of her. She turned away from the girls, who were looking at her curiously, and gulped at the cold water until she could slip away, down the long hallway leading out of the locker room, head spinning as she replayed every moment of last night, every minute she’d spent with Malfoy, his defeated posture, every sharp word she’d said, his empty resignation at the end, and, still - _itshouldhavebeenyouitshouldhavebeenyoushouldhavebeenyou_. She made it out of the locker rooms and turned under the stands before the bile rose in her throat again, and she leaned over and retched until her throat burned and all she was vomiting was liquid, and then a few dry heaves, as if her stomach had no more to give but her body was trying desperately to heave up the memories of last night, the regret and dread and wicked crippling icy guilt that was freezing in her veins, as if they were physical things that she could expel. 

“Ginny?” she heard a curious voice, and turned to see Gwenog standing at the edge of the stands, looking at her with concern flaring in her normally stern eyes, and at that - the concern for her, for _her_ \- Ginny dry heaved again. 

“I - an emergency, I need to-” Ginny murmured, barely coherent, head still spinning with Malfoy’s face, but Gwenog seemed to understand, stepped forward to place a hand gently on her shoulder. 

“It’s okay, go.” 

Ginny nodded in appreciation, and immediately Apparated to St. Mungo’s, barely caring if she splinched herself, not caring at the startled looks she received from the reception staff at her mud-splattered Quidditch leathers, at her pale face and the sweat that still poured down her, the faint tang of vomit. 

“Malfoy - Draco Malfoy’s room,” she said, breathless, and the woman looked as if to hesitate, but Ginny just took a step forward, eyes flashing brightly, and the reception witch nodded tightly and gestured for Ginny to follow. The trip through the gleaming white of the hospital seemed endless, and Ginny couldn’t remember a time when this journey had seemed to take so long - not even when it had been her father, attacked by a snake in the night, because then she’d had her family surrounding her, and worry had been her constant companion, not this roiling sickening guilt that weighed heavy on her heart, turning it leaden. When they finally reached Malfoy’s room, the nurse hesitated, started as if to go in and announce Ginny, but Ginny beat her to it and shoved her way past into the room, and the receptionist just skittered back to her post with a timid look at the fierce, famous redhead. 

The sharp exhale when Ginny saw that Malfoy was alive - awake, even - caught his attention, made him turn from where he’d been propped up on a stack of pillows, eyes staring blankly up at the ceiling, to look at her, his mouth falling open just slightly and his brow knitting in confusion. 

“Weasley? What are you doing here?” he asked, too surprised or too tired to be cruel. 

And at that moment she saw, starkly lit by the overhead lights in a way that the moonlight had obscured, the sharp, hollow panes of his face, the circles under his eyes so dark they almost looked like bruises, the days-old stubble along his jaw, and then, in a flash before he noticed her gaze and tucked them out of sight, the forearms tightly wrapped in spelled bandages, and Ginny felt something within her, something that had been held together by odds and ends of scavenged comfort and mostly sheer will, something she’d thought she’d held strong but that had instead warped, turned brittle, felt that something shatter in her chest into a thousand razor-sharp pieces. 

“What in Merlin’s name were you thinking, Malfoy? How could you be so bloody stupid? Why, why would you listen to me?” Her voice was rising and she felt the door slide shut behind her with a click, eyes too blurry with unshed tears to tell if it was Malfoy or some untamed magic of her own. “I don’t... you shouldn’t... nothing I said _mattered_ , not that much, not _this_ much,” now with a gesture at his hospital bed, at the bandaged arms she’d seen, “and why would you listen to me anyway? I’m a Weasley, why would you care what someone like me thinks? I didn’t even... I don’t even _think_ that, I wasn’t--I was just mad at Harry again, not even at you, and you were just _there_ , I didn’t think you’d-- I didn’t realize you’d...” and she realized that tears were streaming down her face, and she was interrupted by the sudden sob that escaped her, inexplicably, and she slid her hands up to cover her face as if she could hide her tears and her shame from him, suddenly understanding that she was standing in front of Draco Malfoy, sobbing. 

There was silence in the room, except for the sound of her muffled cries, for a few long minutes, and she heard the slight rustling of the bedsheets and looked up to see that he was sitting further up now, looking carefully at a spot just over her shoulder. 

“Weasley, while I appreciate the dramatic speech, you can go away and comfort your noble Gryffindor heart with the knowledge that my decision had nothing to your with your theatrics last night.” 

That stopped Ginny in her tracks, and she paused, eyeing him carefully even as she sniffled slightly. “What?” 

“If you must know, yesterday I found out that my mother is ill. A rare side effect of prolonged exposure to Dark Magic. She’s dying.” His gaze had drifted further away from Ginny, to the blank stretch of wall next her, and his voice had lost even the hint of confusion that had tinged it earlier, so that now it was just... empty. Tired. 

“Fuck Merlin,” Ginny murmured. “And that... and you...?” 

“Yes.”

She felt herself sink back against the wall and then slide slowly down it, until her palms were pressed against the floor and her legs sprawled in front of her, as her mind and body worked through this new information, as she waited for it to soothe her guilt, but instead those words kept spearing through her mind - _it should have been you_ \- and she wondered if, regardless of what Malfoy had said, if she’d been nicer, hadn’t said those terrible things, if maybe he’d have changed his mind. As if to distract herself from the roiling emotion within her, she glanced around the room - which was blessedly a single, something she hadn’t even bothered to check before she’d begun her rant, and noticed it was... empty. Not even a single vase of flowers, much less any sign that anyone had come to visit. 

“Malfoy... where’s the stuff? Condolence stuff, gifts your visitors brought, stuff from home?” 

Her gaze drifted back to him to find him looking at her now, grey eyes sharp and calculating, as if weighing something about her words. Weighing done, he sank back against the pillows and looked up at the ceiling again. 

“There is none. I haven’t received anything or anyone.” 

That empty, shattered spot where Ginny’s patched up heart had once lived ached, as if he’d reached out and twisted it, but he wasn’t even trying to be cruel, was just looking up blankly again. No one... but it’d been in the papers... and Ginny remembered the conversation she’d heard in the Harpies’ locker room, remembered his dad was in Azkaban, thought of his sniping, aloof housemates, realized his mum would be in no shape to come. Her hands curled into tight fists against the cold tile of the floor.

She’d been thinking too long, because his gaze had swiveled back to her. “Aren’t you going to laugh or gloat? That no one’s coming, and I’m all alone?” 

“No.” 

“Are you going to start crying again?” 

“No!” 

“Then why aren’t you leaving,” he said, voice flat and emotionless, devoid of tone, and that, more than anything, was what shook Ginny to her core. She’d stormed into his room and made a fool of herself, _cried_ in front of him, all of that should have been fodder for him to make fun of her with, for that sharp, cruel tongue she remembered so well, but he was just looking at the wall above her, reclined back on the pillows again as if the few moments he’d sat up to stare at her had exhausted him completely. 

“I’m keeping you company, Malfoy.” 

His head turned sharply to look at her. “No.” 

“Yes, I am,” she said in a tone that brooked no argument, the tone she’d heard from her mum a thousand times before, that _yes, you will eat your vegetables, no, you will not fly to Luna’s_ voice, and waited for Malfoy to rise to her challenge, to threaten her, to call a nurse, to tell the staff that she was disrupting his care routine and have her thrown out, even an old familiar my father will hear about this, _anything_. 

But he just sighed heavily and turned over, so that his back was to her. “Suit yourself, Weasley.” 

They stayed like that for what felt like ages, Malfoy silent and turned away, Ginny leaning against the wall, with nothing to do but stare at the back of Malfoy’s head and the line of his bare back she could see through the hospital gown. He was so thin she could see every knob of his spine, stiff even now, could see the taut muscles that remained as a reminder that he’d once been fit, been a Seeker, the curve of his shoulder blades sharp and angular. He’d cut his hair shorter than he’d kept it at Hogwarts at some point, but was overdue for a trim - she could see the back of his neck through the unkempt mess where he’d been laying on it all day, the long, pale column of his neck. She wondered if he knew he had a smattering of freckles there, just a barely there dusting, probably from flying. His breathing was so shallow and steady that Ginny felt certain he’d fallen asleep, until she heard a voice float across the room and the rustle of sheets as Malfoy turned himself over to look at her. 

“Well, if you’re not going to leave me in peace, at least tell me what Potter fucked up now so I can enjoy myself a little bit.” 

She bit back a snicker, but mostly exhaled in foreign relief at the fact that he was talking, moving, doing anything that reminded her of a human being instead of the empty shell he’d been a few moments ago. 

“Harry hasn’t fucked anything up. We just had an argument.” Malfoy started to turn back over, and that, more than anything, made her keep going. “We’re living at Grimmauld Place--” A snort from Malfoy’s side of the room. “You know it?” 

“Notoriously grim and barbaric, even for a Black family property. My m-- I used to hear stories.” 

Realizing what he’d almost just said, remembering the Black family tree, Ginny plowed ahead. “I shudder to think what it was like in its heyday, if how bad it is now is any indication. Anyway, we’ve been trying to clean it up, but it’s like the house doesn’t _want_ us to. Everything is a battle. Especially against the very loud, very mean, very stuck portraits.” She watched Malfoy’s mouth to see if it twitched in even the hint of a smile, but nothing. “I want to move somewhere new, hate the house and all the memories in it, but,” she shrugged, “it’s the only place Harry feels close to Sirius.” 

She looked up to see Malfoy watching her with something curious in those cool grey eyes. “Do you feel close to Sirius Black in it?” 

Ginny swallowed heavily, weighing what she wanted to reveal to Malfoy, _Malfoy,_ of all people, but... she’d already fairly well established that he didn’t have any friends to tell her secrets to, and it wasn’t as if she and Harry arguing over the house was a secret, per se, anyway.

“I mean... I guess my only memories of Sirius are in that house, so in one sense, yes, but... they aren’t good memories. He wasn’t happy there. And my other memories of being there, even the ones that were happy, they’re... tainted now. Because so many of the people in them are dead, or almost died. That’s all I can think about.” 

“Have you told Potter this stuff?”

“Yes. Well, most of it. Not the part about Sirius, about him not being happy in that house. It... it doesn’t feel right. Sirius was Harry’s godfather. The closest thing he had to a dad for a few years. It’s not my place to say stuff like that.” 

Malfoy snorted and rolled his eyes. “And since when have Weasleys been concerned with keeping to their place?” 

It was the most Malfoy-like thing he’d said or done all day, and for some reason, that made Ginny smile.


End file.
